


but I heard a reed of Coolaney say

by Kt_fairy



Series: let the river rush in [15]
Category: The Terror (TV 2018)
Genre: Angst and Fluff and Smut, Fluff and Angst, Francis had his day almost ruined, Hand Jobs, Healthy Relationships, M/M, Period Typical Attitudes, Personal Growth, Science Bros, mentions of Francis' childhood, period typical anti-irishness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-16
Updated: 2020-08-16
Packaged: 2021-03-06 03:20:35
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,536
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25936552
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kt_fairy/pseuds/Kt_fairy
Summary: He was about to turn back when an upbraiding voice rose above the polite commotion, and all noise faded, Francis' shoulders stiffening as what felt like a great, cold weight settled in his stomach. It was creaking, and weakened with age, but Francis would know that voice anywhere. Had heard it, snarling and mocking, whenever 'Irish' had been thrown at him over the past forty-three years.ORSometimes, personal growth has to be put to the test.
Relationships: Captain Francis Crozier/Commander James Fitzjames
Series: let the river rush in [15]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1458220
Comments: 20
Kudos: 50





	but I heard a reed of Coolaney say

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you sososososo much to MsKingBean for her time, her effort, her finding words that I cannot, and for being my continued inspiration. 
> 
> Alice - there's a nugget in here for you.
> 
> Hap Birth FRMC!!

**-1856**

“...and so both the trade winds, and the polar winds - easterlies as you know - are caused by cycles of warmed air rising, and cooled air descending, at the 30th and 60th parallels each, then the atmosphere between those two latitudes must be affected. It makes perfect sense, it is simply that no one has thought of it before now."

Francis was aware that he was dangerously close to being an old bore, rambling on about the latest discoveries in meteorology to one who had no special interest. But James was paying close attention, his head dipped toward Francis as they made their unhurried descent from the Royal Society’s lofty reading rooms.

They were housed in the North Wing of Somerset House, London’s sweeping, neoclassical public palace, built at the turn of the century for the housing of ' _learned societies, public offices, and naval administrators'._ Its rooms were elegantly opulent, and its corridors grand, the whole place as busy as it tended to be on a dull, close spring afternoon; the sense of bustle and studious talk comforting in a way Francis had never found in the other great monoliths of empire and excellence he had frequented (namely the Admiralty). 

Back in ‘43 when he had been an unhappier man, Francis had felt an ugly sting of satisfaction that he had been elected a Fellowship and not Ross, that charisma and charm counted for nothing in the face of science. Now, he held it to be more of an honour than anything the navy or the Queen had ever given him; that men who had educated and encouraged him as a young man had found enough value in his work to have him join them as a Fellow - and that other eminent scientists had agreed with them. 

James, of course, was of the opinion that it was no less than Francis deserved for all his hard work and expertise; proud in the way one often was for those one held dear. He was always willing to keep spelling and grammar in check on papers Francis was to present to the society, to detour from their day or traipse across London to find an article in the reading rooms (as they had today). Or to simply listen, just as he was now, elbow bumping against Francis’ as they made the last turn on the steep spiral stairs.

“I hope I am not over simplifying,” James said quietly, fingers playing over the felt brim of his hat he had clutched in his hand, allowing it to bounce off his thigh with every step. “This newly discovered cycle of atmosphere sounds rather like an eddy. Air moves with a similar principle to water, after all, and the flow of currents do push on water it cannot reach - an active force creating a passive motion, and so on."

“Precisely. An eddy,” Francis smiled, stepping carefully from the carpeted stairs and onto the highly polished marble floor of the long atrium that was echoing with activity. "Anyone would think you're a sailor, James."

"Ah. I had hoped leaving the old tub in Portsmouth might throw my scent off," James murmured. He still had the air of sunshine and a salt breeze about him, the Crimea lingering in the weathered, ruddy tan on his cheeks that on any other man would have looked provincial. It highlighted the glint in his eye and the flash of his teeth as a warm smile passed over his face, shifting quickly back into polite blankness when a voice resounded out in that way that came naturally to all Admirals, startling the clerk sitting at the reception desk.

"Sir Francis! Ah, my good man, it is good to see you," Frederick Beechey (namesake of the island) beamed as he waved them over; his wide blue eyes as keen and his handshake unfailingly firm as when Francis had first known him as a young lieutenant on _HMS Fury_ in ‘21.“Was just saying to Sabine here, been far too long since you graced these learned corridors with your presence.”

“Indeed it has, Admiral,” Francis greeted, shaking the narrow hand of his old friend Colonel Sabine. “I was called to my duty, I am afraid.”

“And it was fine work, chasing the Tzar back into his tyrant’s lair,” Beechey spared James a kind smile. “Fine work to you both. Always a pleasure to have you as our guest, Captain Fitzjames.”  
  


“Thank you, sir.”

“So old boy,” Beechey turned back to Francis, “come along to catch up with all the lurches of progress made in your absence, have you?”

“To reclaim my southern corner of the reading room, mostly,” Francis said lightly and Beechey laughed, clapping Francis on the back as he steered them all towards the wide front door.

“We kept it clear for you, knew you’d never come to see us otherwise."

"You have been sticking rather close to home and heart of late my friend,” Sabine pointed out kindly, Dublin always weaving around his vowels whenever he spoke with Francis.

“That is the boon of a supposed retirement, Sabine, get to come and go at one's leisure," Francis cast him a smile. "No, I do try to keep abreast of things, as you know. Progress and understanding can move fast when you’re not looking.”

“These days progress happens while you’re looking at it,” Sabine commented. "New machines and processes, I am kept on my toes staying ahead of all the young officers at Greenwich. This fellow," he turned to James,"once chief amongst them.” 

"If I remember correctly, Colonel, you had me very much on my toes,” James said with dry good humour, tipping his hat onto his head as they stepped out into the shaded colonnade that lead from the Strand - the broad and often chaotic thoroughfare through the centre of London - to the majestic, peaceful courtyard of Somerset House.

Or, it was usually peaceful. Currently there was some disturbance at the far end of the colonnade. Footmen were amongst the small crowd, as were three ladies, worry obvious in their countenance and they fluttered about the elderly gentleman who was leaning against one of the columns. 

“Oh dear,” Sabine said gently.

“Poor fellow, it is rather a close day. Should we call a cab?” Beechey asked, peering at the crowd.

“I will go and see what help might be needed,” said James, nodding to them before striding off down the black and white tiled walkway, swinging his cane as he went.

Francis watched him go, the smooth confidence in every line of him making it seem as if the stately building had been designed around James. A romantic notion, maybe, but Francis allowed them here and there, in the times when he would not feel so old and foolish for thinking them.

He was about to turn back when an upbraiding voice rose above the polite commotion, and all noise faded, Francis' shoulders stiffening as what felt like a great, cold weight settled in his stomach. It was creaking, and weakened with age, but Francis would know that voice anywhere. Had heard it, snarling and mocking, whenever 'Irish' had been thrown at him over the past forty-three years.

Francis took a harder look at the old man, trying to work out if those wizened, once handsome features truly belonged to that bastard of a lieutenant who had done his best to torment Francis aboard _HMS Briton_. Who had so taken against a child for nothing more than his Irishness; scolding him so harshly, making such threats of punishment that Francis would be too scared to eat, or sending him up the rigging in a gale to see if he would betray any Catholic papistry in his frightened prayers.

Who had almost thrashed Francis before the crew for the disrespect of insisting his sextant readings were accurate, for the other boys daring to agree that the lieutenant had been mistaken, until Captain Staines had stepped in and put a stop to it all.

" _Irish!_ " the lieutenant would tell Francis as if commenting on the weather. " _Your kind are drunks, liars, and, by breeding, meant for nothing more than hard labour - if your inherent criminality does not see you swing out your life on the end of a rope. Do not think you shall ever rise higher than that."_

“Well,” James’ voice broke through Francis’ tumbling thoughts, enough of an unimpressed edge to it that Francis almost flinched as he looked up at him. “The gentleman had come to visit his son in the naval offices, and came over faint. He is being frightfully churlish, which his granddaughter assured me means he is perfectly well.”

Beechey huffed in that English way which meant he thought too little of that to comment, Sabine merely saying that 'age does not always bring the wisdom of even temper' as they set off towards the Strand. 

Francis hesitated, glancing over at the crowd that had parted to allow a doctor through. He was neither reeling, nor panicked, nor numbed with shock; there was simply the tangle of those unhappy, cruel memories, and a faint confusion at how that man, that terror, was now so old and frail.

It was only a moment’s dithering, but James had hung back, half turned towards Francis while he regarded him with eyes that were almost unreadable in the shadows of the colonnade. 

Francis knew the same could not be said for his face, which had always given away his every emotion. Not that he had any idea what his expression could be now, so dazed did he feel. Whatever James saw had him glancing about, uncertain, and a fear of James realising why he paused (for he had told James all this long ago, on one of those nights where it would be a matter of either drinking or going out of his mind if James were not there with him) finally caused his heavy legs to work, allowing James to take his arm even though it sent a prickle of discomfort through Francis. The same feeling that used to make him want to hide in crowded rooms. 

James pressed his fingertips into the crook of Francis’ elbow, and by the time they had stepped into the din of voices, rattling carriages, and the stink of horses that was London at large, the touch had become something of a comfort.

Francis forced his thoughts back to the present long enough to make his farewells; agreeing to go to dinner at the Beecheys’ (“Mrs Beechey will be most displeased with me if you do not come, and I aim to never displease my wife”), and to view the new magnetic equipment Sabine had collected at the Observatory, before they parted company.

He looked over his shoulder as he and James made their way westwards along the Strand, eyes glancing off the immaculate masonry about the graceful arch they had just exited from, before turning his gaze to the pavement.

Francis had seen the lieutenant three times since _Briton_ had been paid off. Twice in Portsmouth, although in the crowded city Francis had managed to remain unseen, and once in the corridors of the Admiralty; where he had needed to steer a younger, more impetuous James Ross away from the man lest he say something about the way he had sneered at Francis.

To have been recognised back then had appalled him as much as seeing the lieutenant ever had; that time and experience, that life lived, had not made him so very different from the painfully middle-class boy who had never realised he was _Irish_ , and all the foul things it supposedly entailed, until that lieutenant had first heard him speak.

It had become a reflex to expect all those old hurts to come on again, to sting and smart as if scurvy were running through him, prising each one open once again. Francis braced himself for it as he walked, heedless of the direction or the distance, tensing until his jaw ached, before forcing himself to still, then doing it all over again. 

Memory liked to dwell on the bad things, he knew that well enough. To pore over the cruelties of word and deed one had endured. But there had been friendship and laughter amongst the boys and midshipmen, and the kindness and trust the Captain had shown in him. There had been Joe Henry, the topman who had kept a hold of Francis when he had been forced into the rigging, the wind and the rain making the very masts shake and creak in their rage as the deck pitched and rolled seemingly miles below, and told Francis tales of Jamaica to quell his panic. 

For every man like that lieutenant, there had been kinder men; a Lieutenant Beechey, a James Clarke Ross, and, eventually, a James Fitzjames.

“.. or we can take a turn about St James’ park until it gets dark,” James was saying in a purposefully conversational tone, hand flexing on Francis’ arm in a way that demanded his attention. “Which should not be long. Then we can pretend you came across me beneath a tree, and have engaged my services…”  
  


“That’s not funny, James.” Francis felt his face heat as he glanced about, blinking up at the untouchable image of Lord Nelson set high above London on his column, before frowning at James. "My name works perfectly well to get my attention."

“I have used it twice already," James shot back, then gentled his voice to a murmur, "Besides, you are brooding, and I am duty bound to try and break you from that.”

“I’m fine,” he said, which was met with as sceptical a 'hmm' as Francis had ever received. He remembered himself before he took a deep breath of London’s stale, choking air, tugging on the bottom of his waistcoat as he let everything settle in the knowledge that it had no power over him now. Even if bitterness lingered on like a bad taste. 

“Only, I think I could do with a walk,” he said, which was not a lie. There was no sense of trepidation at having to delve into himself and lay all this bare, as the boon of having struggled through it once was never having to do it again. A word would bring James’ understanding, but Francis was hardly going to do that in the damned street.

Besides, he thought, feeling stubborn now he had come out the other side of the shock, he would not be chased home. He would damned well continue to enjoy what had been a rather pleasant day.

“Then we shall take a scenic route home," James said, tapping his cane once on the pavement as he steered them to continue on westwards. 

"Around St James' park?" Francis put in before James could say it, letting his shoulder bump against James’ when he began to bemoan his predictability. 

* ***** *

The shadows had just begun to lengthen by the time they reached home. The weak evening sun slanted through the curtains of Francis’ room, throwing distorted silhouettes over the polished wooden floor that hardly creaked under his footfall as he went through the quiet, familiar motions of shaving and changing his shirt after a long day. 

Someone was playing the piano next door, Francis unable to identify the pretty tune that was just audible through the wall, but took the edge off the silence that made being off ship so unsettling sometimes. The comforting creaks and murmur of human activity replaced with genteel quiet. 

At least he could hear the rumble of James’ voice resonate up through the house from where he was speaking to Daisy in the study; a smile coming on unbidden as he buttoned his shirt cuffs when he heard the echo of the ungainly laugh James never used in public.

He had his waistcoat rebuttoned and was fiddling with his cravat when he heard James’ footsteps on the stairs. Turning at the knock that followed James strolling through the door, letting in the smell of furniture polish which purveyed the whole house when Daisy was spring cleaning. 

“We need new curtains in the parlour,” James announced, crossing the room to take over tying Francis’ cravat. “They did not stand up very well to a washing, apparently.”

“Will you wait until next week so that Mrs Coningham can choose?” Francis asked, feeling the bob of his Adam’s apple brush against James’ fingers. “Or _we_ can go on Friday.”

“You do not trust me with the choice of curtains?” James smiled, smoothing down the front of Francis’ waistcoat as he stepped back. “Even if I promise not to pick any patterns?”

“No,” Francis said as he turned to quickly check himself in the mirror, thinking of James’ penchant for apricot silk dressing gowns and overly patterned, bright yellow upholstery. 

“Well, I shan’t argue having your company,” James conceded. Francis watched him in the mirror as he perched on the edge of his bed, James’ mouth pressing into a familiar, pensive line for a moment before he caught Francis’ eyes in the reflection. “I do not mean to press - or to _nag_ , God forbid,” he said as he hooked one ankle over the other. “You need not tell me of every turn of your mood - only, are you all right, Francis? You were having a fine time all day, and then…”

“I am Irish, James,” Francis said as he turned from the mirror. “It gives me an abiding sense of tragedy, which sustains me through periods of joy.”

James almost smiled, but managed to turn it into a raised brow as he flicked the lock of greying hair from his eyes. “I said you do not have to tell me.”

“I was… I was thinking about when I was a boy,” Francis admitted, feeling suddenly rather awkward standing in the middle of his own bedroom in his shirt sleeves. 

James’ eyes widened ever so slightly, uncrossing his legs as he sat up straighter, holding his hand out to Francis that he took at once. “Oh Francis,” he breathed, looking at a loss for what else to say, which Francis could not hold against him. There was little that could be said about his boyhood.

“As a boy on the _Briton_ ," he clarified, and immediately wished he hadn’t.

“ _Francis_ …” James began, releasing Francis’ fingers when he turned and walked over to his chest of draws. 

“You remember the package I received on our return from the Black Sea. Things that my sister sent to me,” he said, retrieving said box from the bottom draw, full of letters and trinkets of a life he had never really known, going over to place it carefully onto bed. James turned towards it, hands clasped in his lap as he looked on quietly; listening in that intent way of his that Francis had once taken as condescension, and now knew to be the tick of an intelligent boy who was quick to learn, and the habit of a man who considered everything said to him. 

“I had wondered if it might have been this,” James nodded. Allowing Francis, for the moment, to tell him this half truth. 

“It had been on my mind - my first years in the navy that is,” he explained, feeling a breathless sort of nervousness as he pulled out a black cardboard sleeve, flipping it open to reveal a slightly faded watercolour within.

The image was more soft and sweet than Francis thought he had even been, even as a boy of three-and-ten. His cheeks were still smooth, his hair still bright red, the reticent shyness clear in his bright blue eyes. His perfect boyishness rendered with the affection of a sister who was not to see her brother again for years.

“Oh, look at you,” James gasped, eyes sparkling as he took it from Francis’ fingers as if it were a great work of art, and the well of vulnerability that had opened in Francis’ chest receded slightly. 

“It is rather childishly drawn, but she was nineteen at the time…”

“Nonsense, it is charming,” James beamed up at Francis, grasping his sleeve and making him sit down beside him. 

“I had not a freckle before I sailed into the Atlantic, you know. I burned horribly,” he said, feeling his face heat at the delight in James’ smile. “Been there ever since, no matter how I have avoided the sun.”

“There are worse things to carry with you than sunshine, my dear.”

Francis shook his head, “your poetry…”

“It’s lousy, I know,” James stated proudly, laying his hand on Francis’ shoulder as he gave him a soft kiss. “This is a very dear image, and I am very pleased you chose to show it to me.”

"Of course," Francis murmured, frowning at the image of that child who had so many trials ahead of him, wondering, briefly, if he had only shown James that half forgotten image to ensure his sympathy. He glanced back at James who was watching him with clear affection, expression open in a way that would have appalled them both ten years go. “Do you remember when I told you of the lieutenant who had it in for me on the _Briton._ ”

“How could I forget,” James said flatly, a scowl wrinkling his brow. “The utter _beast_.”

Francis nodded, then said with surprising calmness, “I saw him today outside the Royal Society.”

If James realised just who it had been, he did not show it. He shifted closer, smoothing his hand down between Francis’ shoulders. “That must have been an awful shock,” he said carefully.

“Not as much as I thought it would be, after I had recovered from the surprise of seeing him… of his still being alive, honestly. I was able to come out the other side of it only mildly tender in places.”

“I am very glad to hear it,” James murmured, fingers sweeping slowly over Francis’ lower back. " _'_ _That I were a man, I would eat his heart in the_ _marketplace',_ " he recited, glancing down at the watercolour, tapping the worn edge of the frame with his fingertips before closing it with reverent sort of care, looking back at Francis with a smile in his eyes. “Nevertheless, I would have been grieved if it had wounded you. Let alone in a place where you are so at ease, and so respected. As I am of the esteemed opinion that your soft, gentle heart finally deserves its peace." 

Francis nodded, relieved that James had neither fussed nor become profound; allowing him to stay as far away from it all as he wanted to.

“If I am to be honest," Francis said drily. "I was more alarmed by the prospect of coming home to those bloody ugly dog statues you've put beside the fireplace.”

"I think they're charming!” James protested, just as he had done ever since he had brought the damned awful china spaniels home. “I like them."

"You have a habit of finding peculiar things charming.”

James shot him an unimpressed look, reaching across Francis to lay that old, faded watercolour down into the box before taking Francis’ face in his hands. “I love you very dearly,” he said in all seriousness. “So I suppose I do.”

“Suppose?” Francis asked, touching James’ waist.

“Suppose,” James confirmed, and kissed him softly. 

The intention was brief, but Francis tightened his grip on James’ waist, needing some closeness and warmth despite how philosophical he had managed to be, and James was happy to give it.

Francis ended up laid out across the counterpane, James having destroyed his careful tying of Francis’ cravat when he had sought out the tender spot beneath his jaw to kiss. His fingers were a warm pressure on Francis’ chest and his thigh a solid weight between his legs, undemanding despite the slow stiffening Francis could feel against his hip.

He placed his hand on the back of James’ thigh, feeling the muscle shift as James whispered, “you need not,” into his ear, trying to readjust his legs, but Francis kept him in place. 

Francis grunted in triumph when he got the hang of James’ fashionable button fly, James gasping when Francis un-bunched his shirt from his trousers in order to get his hand on the soft, heated flesh of his prick. 

He had not thought he would match James in his ardour, but clever fingers kneaded and grasped him through his trousers, James’ sighs against his mouth and the slow rock of his hips into Francis’ grip encouraging his body into wakefulness. 

A triumphant smile was pressed to Francis’ lips as James undid his trousers, then he sat up on his knees to throw off his fine grey frock coat. Francis trailed his fingers over James’ thighs as he admired the way the green brocade waistcoat swept over the lines of James' body, then laughed when James muttered, “ _bugger_ ”, and clambered off the bed to retrieve his handkerchief from his coat pocket. 

James placed Francis hand under his shirt, against his warm lower back, when he lay his solid weight back on top of him; taking them both in his broad, rough palm as Francis kissed his neck and shoulder through his shirt. 

There was only the sound their breathing and the clink of buttons catching together as they moved in unhurried familiarity. Rising and rising to their peak and then easing down the other side with uncomplicated pleasure.

“Do you know,” James said in the drowsy aftermath, his fingers tracing rapid, un-drowsy patterns on Francis’ arm and keeping him from dozing off.

“No,” Francis muttered, picking his head up off James’ shoulder to look at his face that was tipped towards the shadows on the ceiling. 

“I do understand how easy it is to let yourself sound the same as everyone else. Society expects a - a conformity, and the navy makes it so easy, being about Scots and English and the like from a young age. But I am… glad you never lost your accent.”

“Ungainly as it is?”

“Yes, ungainly as it is,” James smiled, fingers reversing the pattern they were drawing. “Speaks of your fortitude.”

Francis raised a brow. He did not correct James’ pronouncement of fortitude to ‘pig-headedness’, for James was unflinching in as many ways as he was giving, bold down to his bones, and yet he had turned himself inside out to fit where the world wished him. To hide what was deemed unpalatable; his parentage, his upbringing, the varieties of himself - and maybe, once, the remnants of an accent.

"There are many different types of fortitude," Francis said instead. "And of the sense needed to use it."

James gave Francis' arm a squeeze. "I've always had more perseverance than sense," he glanced at Francis before looking back at the ceiling. "Served me well enough, I suppose."

Francis pressed a kiss to the spot just above James' heart, an _I love you_ of action rather than words, and lay his head back down onto the lumpy pillow of James’ shoulder. 

  
  
  


_But I heard a reed of Coolaney say,_

_When the wind has laughed and murmured and sung,_

_The lonely of heart is withered away._

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> If you spotted the Yeats and the Joan Baez quote, have a cookie. 
> 
> and here is [lil baby Jared Harris](https://twitter.com/icicaille_/status/1290781361901637632/photo/1) as a reference for the portrait.
> 
> I went down a rabbit-hole, and found Francis Crozier's [election form](https://collections.royalsociety.org/DServe.exe?dsqIni=Dserve.ini&dsqApp=Archive&dsqDb=Catalog&dsqSearch=RefNo==%27EC%2F1843%2F24%27&dsqCmd=Show.tcl) for the Royal Society. Containing such signatures as Beaufort and Beechey, John Barrow, John Gould (who did a very pretty book on toucans) and John Herschel (who if you're a space nerd like me is kinda exciting).


End file.
